Happy Valentine's Day!

Enjoying his Valentine's sugar cookie!

Over the years Paul and I have gone from one extreme to another when it comes to celebrating Valentine's Day. Some years we got each other a really nice gift. A couple of times Paul got me a nice piece of jewelry, for example. Some years we've given something small like a little bit of candy or a card. Other years we haven't bought anything. Most years we at least went out to dinner, although that didn't happen last year. The babysitter I contacted wasn't available this weekend, but we have plans to go out next Saturday (22nd). This year I gave Paul a candy bar and hand written card. For the first time ever, I got Nadia and Ian each one small gift. I got Nadia books #4-6 of the Imagination Station series and Ian a CD of John Williams' music (Star Wars, etc.). Yesterday we made the sugar cookie dough and let it chill overnight in the refrigerator. Today Nadia helped me decorate the heart shaped sugar cookies. Yesterday I helped Nadia and Ian make Valentine's Day cards for Paul, and I asked Paul to help them make cards for me.

I would have had him wear red, but he dressed himself today.

This morning I made a special breakfast for everyone. I used five eggs and six slices of bread (two for Paul and one for each of the rest of us). I cut a heart shape out of the middle of the bread (and put jelly on those small hearts for the kids) and cooked an egg inside the heart shaped hole (just an egg white in the one in the photo but I had an egg yolk in the middle of the egg white in the other five). Ian didn't eat much of the egg, but the other four of us enjoyed our special Valentine's Day breakfast. Nadia remembered that last year I made heart shaped chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast, and she asked that I make them for lunch. Ian declared it was the best lunch I had ever made. The dinner menu didn't include any hearts, but I made one of Paul's favorite meals (manicotti), which I don't make very often. Ian fussed and cried over the meal for several minutes, and then I forced him to take one bite. He loved it. Why must he assume he is not going to like everything before he even tastes it?

Everyone ate the meal, which was quite the contrast to last night when Nadia threw up at dinner, and Ian only ate a couple of bites of the ham and northern bean soup I made. Nadia and Ian asked me if I could make manicotti every week. Well I'm not going to make it that often, but I will certainly make it several times a year now that I know all five of us enjoy it. Dinner ended up being my favorite part of the day because of how well it went (and we weren't eating pizza). My other favorite moment today was when I was doing the dishes (not my favorite chore) and Oliver came up and wrapped his arms around my legs and said "I love you." He also told Nadia and Paul "I love you" at other points in the day. What a sweetheart he is!

Today we submitted Paul's application to Bucknell. Prayers are appreciated that he will be selected to interview for the position. Last night I submitted an application for him to the University of the Virgin Islands. I wouldn't mind living in the Caribbean for a couple of years.

The kids wrote most of the words in their Valentine's Day cards, but one part we wrote what Ian said. We had each child give 4-5 reasons why they love Mom/Dad. Nadia wrote her list for me herself. Here is what she wrote:

5 reasons I loves mommy

1. Played with my stickers
2. Gives grat hugs
3. Gives cises (kisses)
4. Reads books
5. Does schoolwork with me

I will definitely be saving this card for many, many years to come. Priceless!

Our Valentine's Day breakfast

Ian's lunch

Nadia's lunch

Thankful Thursday

1. I am SO thankful that Dr. Canning was able to complete the entire hypospadias repair in just one surgery! Here's to hoping and praying that many years pass before anyone in our family has another surgery. I've entered an operating room six times over the past 5 1/2 years, Ian had four surgeries, and Oliver had one.

2. I am also very grateful that Paul's parents were able to watch Nadia and Ian, especially as we ended up being gone from the house for 29 hours straight (longer than expected).

3. We've been enjoying our Olympic unit the past couple of weeks. One of the great things about teaching is that your students aren't the only ones who are learning. I learned a few things about some different sports and famous athletes as well!

4. My former Dean, my former Department Chair, and a former colleague all agreed to write me letters of recommendation. I was able to obtain a report of my cumulative student evaluations from 2004-2012.

5. Paul got a snow day today! He's had two weeks in a row of just teaching two days a week. I'm sure his students were even more appreciative of the day off today because he was going to be giving an exam in his 9:30 class.

6. We went to a program at the library on Tuesday afternoon about soup. The kids cut up potatoes and carrots and dumped other ingredients into the slow cooker to make chicken vegetable soup. The librarian read a few books about soup, they made a craft about soup, and of course ate the soup. Well my kids didn't eat the soup. They ate the crackers and rolls that were served with the soup. There was a reporter from the newspaper taking pictures, and they were in the newspaper yesterday!

7. Paul called me last night during choir rehearsal. Normally I wouldn't take a call then, but I knew it had to be important for him to call me then. I came home right away when he told me Oliver's stent came out (7-9 days before it was supposed to come out). It was still attached to him by a stitch, but it was hanging outside his body. When I got home I called the hospital and the urology resident on call called me back a few minutes later. He talked with Dr. Canning and then called me back and told me to snip the threads, put a diaper on Oliver, give him fluids, and see if he peed within an hour.

A few minutes later Dr. Canning called me, and he said I could call him back on his cell phone at any time during the night (even though he wasn't officially on call that night). He said that some urologists only leave the stent in for 7 days (he does 12-14). It would have been "disastrous" if it had been in for less than 48 hours, but he was hopeful that since it had been in for 5 days, it would be okay. They knew the snow storm was about to start and didn't think we could drive to Philadelphia safely in a snow storm. If he wasn't able to pee, then we were to take him to the local hospital, which also has a pediatric urologist, but Dr. Canning was hoping that wouldn't be necessary as he felt that someone else putting a stent in Oliver might do damage to the construction he did during the surgery last Friday. Oliver did not pee within the next hour. I called Dr. Canning back at 9:30pm, and he said to put Oliver to bed because if Oliver wasn't able to pee he would get very uncomfortable, and we'd be sure to know about it. The resident had said we had to take him to an ER if he didn't pee within one hour. I was glad I was able to talk directly to Dr. Canning. His diaper was wet this morning. Yahooo! We are thankful that he seems to be doing okay even though the stent came out too early. It sure is easier to change his diaper now! The bruising and swelling has also improved tremendously over the past 6 days. The worst is definitely behind us!

8. Yesterday we took a trip to a consignment shop, as they were having a 60% off sale. I got some great bargains on some winter clothes, shoes, snow boots, etc. for next year for Nadia and Ian. I got Ian one thing for now - a Superman hoodie. He has been wearing it round the clock since I bought it. They were supposed to dress up in what they want to be when they grow up for AWANA last night. For awhile Nadia has been saying she wants to be an artist when she grows up, so she wore s smock and had a couple of paint brushes in the pockets of her smock. Ian had been planning to dress up as a fire fighter, until I bought this hoodie. There was no talking him out of it, and I am sure he's not the only four-year-old to want to be a superhero when he grows up. :)

Two more teeth

Yesterday I discovered that Oliver had gained two new teeth over the weekend. The poor guy! He got two more teeth on the top, which means he now has eleven teeth (six on the bottom and five on the top). I expect it won't be long until he gets one more on the top, and then hopefully he'll get a little break from teething once his twelfth tooth comes in. The dressing came off yesterday (gauze and tape). I almost threw up while removing it. I was never meant to be a doctor or a nurse. Putting vaseline on his wounds at each diaper change is almost enough to cause me to pass out. I keep reminding myself that it will get better soon, and this should be the last time we need to go through this (unlike Ian who went through this twice). While I was giving Oliver a bath and removing his dressing, Nadia spilled Ian's glass of milk all over the kitchen floor. She tried to clean it up, but it was still a big mess when we came down. Oliver was in a lot of pain; so Paul and I were trying to give him some Oxycodone, and he was really fighting us on taking the medicine. Meanwhile Ian and Nadia were walking through the puddle of milk on the floor. I was just a tad overwhelmed there for a few minutes, but eventually I mopped the kitchen floor and the medicine kicked in and calmed Oliver down. Whew. Motherhood is not for the faint of heart.

Yesterday we got out the thumb guards again and put them back on Nadia. Now that she has two permanent teeth, she really needs to kick this habit once and for all. Ian eventually needs to stop playing with his belly button, but at least that habit isn't causing any long term damage (although it does get very red sometimes). Thus far Oliver doesn't have any soothing type habit. Yay for him!

Making soup at the library

15-18 months old times three



Nadia at 16 months (October 2009)

1. Two weeks before Nadia turned 18 months old she weighed 24lb 14oz (64th percentile), one day before Ian turned 18 months old he weighed 23lb 15oz (25th percentile), and two days before he turned 18 months old Oliver weighed 24lb 4oz.

2. At 17 months old Nadia's vocabulary exceeded 40 words and included 3 syllable words such as "basketball" and two word combinations like "panda bear." Ian was babbling a lot but not really saying any words. Oliver's speech is not quite as developed as Nadia's was, but he's not too far behind in terms of the size of his vocabulary. He's said about 30 words so far. However, she used FAR more words each dy. The only words he say regularly are: mama, dada, Naia, and yes. Oliver beat her to the punch when it comes to saying his first four word sentence (I want my momma!). Ian and Nadia were farther along than Oliver when it came to making animal sounds at this age.

Ian at 16 months (April 2011)

3. Nadia did a much better job at responding to the word "no" during this age span than Ian or Oliver. Ian had a really hard time sitting in the bathtub and staying far enough from the tv when he was watching something. We're trying to teach Oliver not to get into the garbage can in the kitchen, not to throw food and toys, and not to play with my laptop computer, Paul's printer, or my alarm clock.

4.  Ian and Oliver were both excellent at figuring out how to operate things with buttons that can be pushed.

Nadia at 18 months (12/24/2009)

5. Ian did a much better job of putting things on himself than Nadia or Oliver at this age. He loved to wear things (hats, necklaces, backpacks, jackets, etc.). The boys spent far more time independently playing with toys and looking at books than Nadia did.

6. Ian had 4 teeth (3 on the bottom); his third and fourth teeth came in shortly before he turned 18 months. Nadia had 12 teeth before she was 15 months old. She didn't get any new teeth during this age span. Oliver has 9 teeth (6 on the bottom), which include his 4 molars. Three of those teeth came in recently.

7. During this age span Nadia and Oliver would eat just about anything we offered them. Ian didn't want to eat anything by spoon during this span. Oliver and Nadia were eating table foods, and all of Ian's food came by way of the Magic Bullet. Ian still drank his milk (EleCare) warm. Oliver is drinking cold whole milk, and Nadia was drinking cold 2% milk at this age. Oliver was the first to start using a sippy cup and to feed himself using a fork and spoon.

Ian one day before he turned 18 months old

12. Ian and Oliver were wearing size 18 month clothing with the exception of pants (12 months) when they turned 18 months old, although Oliver is starting to wear more and more size 18 month pants. At 18 months old Nadia was wearing 18 month clothing except for dresses and pjs (24 months).

13. Nadia was still taking 2 naps a day during this age span whereas Ian was only having one afternoon nap a day. Oliver and Nadia took their naps in a crib. Ian took his naps in my arms. Oliver and Nadia slept an average of 11 hours at night. Ian improved a lot in how long he slept during this age span. He had to stay in the crib for at least 10 hours. For quite awhile that was difficult for him, but by 17 months he started sleeping 11 hours and sometimes as long as 12 hours for the first time in his life! Oliver very recently went from two naps to one nap a day.

Oliver at 16 months (December 2013)

14. Ian put his hands in his hair while he was eating All The Time, which wasn't good because there was usually food on his hands. Nadia didn't ever have this bad habit although she had the habit of biting things like books which Ian and Oliver never did. Oliver sometimes gets food in his hair but not as often as Ian did.

15. It was much easier to change Nadia's diaper. Ian and Oliver were such wiggle worms while I changed their diapers.

16. Ian constantly tried to get into my purse and to open doors. Nadia has never at any stage been very interested in either activity. Oliver also has been trying to open doors. Ian loved being in a swing at this age (for the first time) whereas Nadia and Oliver loved it from a much younger age.

17. Ian did a much better with traveling in a car or stroller than Nadia did at this age. Oliver has been like Ian when it comes to the stroller, but he's been in between the two kids when it comes to being in his car seat (better than Nadia but not as good as Ian).

18. Nadia was scared of loud noises - the lawn mower, blowdryer, and vacuum for example. Ian and Oliver were definitely not scared of them!

19. Ian and Oliver loved to throw things. It's a habit we need to break ASAP with Oliver. Both boys hurled their sippy cup whenever they were done with it for example. Of the three kids Oliver is the best at throwing a ball. Ian and Oliver were both far more destructive in terms of quickly making larger messes than Nadia ever was.

20. Oliver and Nadia were much better at being left in the church nursery. Ian had such a hard time separating from me. He actually still cries from time to time over this at the age of four!

21. Nadia and Ian could identify body parts at this age. Oliver isn't doing that yet.

22. Nadia was really into stuffed animals at this age. Ian was into them a little, and Oliver isn't in to them at all thus far. Ian was more interested in cars at this age than Nadia or Oliver.

23. Nadia and Oliver could easily climb up and down the stairs at this age. Ian could only go up.

24. Nadia and Ian were more interested in watching tv at this age than Oliver is (fine by me!).

25. By the time Ian turned 18 months old he had undergone three surgeries, Nadia hadn't had any surgeries, and Oliver had his first surgery on the day he turned 18 months old.

26. Nadia was walking for about 6 months by the time she turned 18 months old. Ian started walking at 15 months, and Oliver had switched from crawling to walking at 17 months.

27. Nadia was very jealous of Ian, who was born when she was this age. Ian never went through a jealous phase. Oliver sometimes gets jealous when Ian is in my lap or Paul's lap, especially when I'm reading the bigger kids a book.

23.5 hours at CHOP

If I could go back in time, I wish we had gone to CHOP for Ian's first urological surgery. We went to our local hospital instead. My guess is that had we gone to CHOP with him from the start, Ian would have had only one urological surgery instead of two. I've been a parent for 5 1/2 years, and I've now survived my two boys going through a total of five surgeries. Nadia has never been under general anesthesia. She asked me the other day if she had ever had this surgery (when she heard me talking about Ian and Oliver). No, sweet girl, it would be impossible for you to need this surgery. I am SO glad we did the testosterone shots, and I am thankful that even though a longer than ideal time passed between the last shot and the surgery (because the surgery was postponed), Dr. Canning was still able to complete the entire repair in one surgery. He had said if we didn't do the shots it would have to be two surgeries. I have been praying fervently and asking others at ladies Bible study, church, etc. to pray that the repair might be able to be done in one surgery, and the Lord answered this prayer request with a YES! What a relief, especially as we don't know what health insurance we'll have in August. The reason we did his surgery later than usual was because we were waiting until we were back on Blue Shield insurance. I am also glad because of course it means one less surgery for Oliver, it means I can potty train him this summer (that couldn't have been done until after the repair was completed), and it means that he won't be sliced open for the next 6 months like Ian was. It was really disgusting to change Ian's diaper for those six months.

Paul's parents arrived at our house around 7:45pm on Thursday night. We left the house at 6:20 yesterday morning. Last time I was 25 minutes late so I allowed 30 minutes longer than I allowed in January, but the traffic was better this time so we were 30 minutes early. We sat in the surgery waiting area for about 90 minutes and then we were in pre-op room #2 for about 90 minutes. A Nurse Practioner did his exam, and she said he has an innocent heart murmur, which was the first anyone ever mentioned that. He had his Versed (to make him drowsy) at noon and was wheeled into the operating room at 12:25. At 1:30pm a nurse came and told us the wonderful news that the doctor had decided the repair could be done in just one surgery. I was thrilled! The surgery was over around 3pm, at which point we talked with the woman doing her fellowship with Dr. Canning. Around 3:30pm we were allowed to join him in the recovery room. It felt wonderful to have him in my arms again although he was really wanting the iv and cords to come off. He was still on a little oxygen because his saturation levels weren't very good. After a time, he was given some apple juice, but he had a bloody nose during the end of the surgery and some of that blood had gotten into his throat and this made him nauseous and the poor boy vomited like he had never done before. Because his saturation levels were still dipping when he was on room air, they said he needed to spend the night at the hospital.

Around 5:30pm we moved to an inpatient room that we shared with a 6 month old baby and his parents. Since Paul and I were both here and there was only one small couch, they replaced the crib with a bed. Oliver and I shared the bed, and Paul slept on the couch. We didn't get much sleep as it was, but at least we were both able to be horizontal. Paul's assistant coach lead the practice last night. They moved the team photos from 11:15 to 1pm so Paul could be in them. We got home just in time for Paul to coach the 12pm game. Oliver and I didn't go to the game. I didn't bring the iPad to CHOP (so the kids could use it) or the camera (one less thing to bring), and if I took a picture with my camera I'd have no way to transfer it anywhere else. So we used the webcam on my laptop to take a few pictures. They are grainy, but they are better than nothing. As u can see, Oliver really enjoyed his blueberry popsicle! I brought the laptop because Paul and I worked on his application for Bucknell during Oliver's surgery.

We didn't bring toothbrushes, pjs, or anything like that for Paul and I because we didn't expect to spend the night. I was really wishing I had worn my glasses instead of my contacts yesterday. My eyes were killing me, as I didn't have any saline with me. While Oliver was in my arms he ate a couple of blue popsicles (very messy endeavor), vomited profusely (filled several basins), and gushed blood all over the place. Amazingly, I didn't get any vomit on me. A little bit of popsicle dripped on me, but not very much. I had a larger spot of blood but it was nothing compared to the blood all over his gown and the sheet on the bed after they removed his iv this morning. My brown jeans helped to hide the blood. Oliver went through three hospital gowns in less than 24 hours as the first was covered in vomit and the second was covered in blood.

I am very glad to be home. When we've been at Geisinger, Evangelical, and Harrisburg Hospitals over the past 5 1/ 2 years, I can say the kids or I have never been discharged at 8:30am. I was pleasantly surprised when the urologist showed up before 7:30am to do his rounds. The dressing will come off on Monday, and the catheter will come out sometime between the 19th-21st. Changing his diaper is not exactly going to be my favorite thing to do over the next two weeks. This too shall pass. The worst is over. I will sleep well tonight!

1.5 years old!

My baby is just 6 months away from turning TWO. How did this happen?!? Some months the changes are more dramatic than others. This has been one of the more remarkable ones because he switched from crawling to walking AND he made big improvements with expanding his expressive vocabulary. His favorite complete sentence is "I want my momma" (or sometimes the sentence ends with the word "mommy" instead of "momma.). When kids are older sometimes a mom grows wear of her name being said again and again and again, but when the child is one year old, it's heart melting to hear things like "I want my momma." He also got three new teeth over the past month. He now has 3 on the top jaw and 6 on the bottom. Since February is the month that our culture focuses on love, I am going to write about things that Oliver loves.

1. He loves brushing his teeth. If that boy is fussing, hand him his toothbrush, and he'll be a happy camper. It's the truth!

2. There are many foods that he loves. Here are a few of his favorites - cheese, goldfish crackers, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, dry cereal, cookies, M&M's, pizza, french fries, animal crackers, and whatever is on Mommy's plate. He eats just about anything, including lettuce and raw baby carrots. Yesterday he had his very first Oreo cookie. As you can see, he liked it!

3. He loves to push buttons on Daddy's printer, Mommy's alarm clock, climb into the dishwasher, and pull the power cord out of Mommy's laptop computer. He's not actually allowed to do any of these things. We are working on teaching him to obey!

4. He loves to look through books (on his own), play with the Leap Frog magnetic letters on the refrigerator, climb into the dryer, empty the "Tupperware" cabinet, empty the toybox, empty his sock drawer, sit at the little kid's table in the living room, dismantle Ian's train tracks, play with a toy laptop computer, and play with things from the play kitchen.

5. He loves to climb anything and everything.

6. He really loves to take a bath. When I'm filling the tub he tries to climb in before I've even taken off his clothes and diaper!

7. He loves to be tickled and for people to play peekaboo with him.

8. The words he says the most often are Mama, Dada, yes, "eh" (which has a very wide variety of meanings), and Nadia. He's also starting to use "all done" and "more" more frequently.

9. He loves to listen to music. The only time something on tv catches his interest is when there's a song playing. He has learned how to turn on the cd player in Nadia's bedroom. He loves to dance to music!

10. He'll drink milk or water, but what he really prefers is apple juice. Recently we transitioned him to a hard spout sippy cup. I'm very happy about that!

11. He LOVES to throw things - most of which he's not supposed to be throwing. We're working on that.

Thankful Thursday

1. I'm grateful that Paul had a safe trip to and from Indiana on Thursday and Friday (into early Saturday morning) last week.

2. Nadia has been enjoying reading Amelia Bedelia books to us the last few days! I know I sound like a broken record, but it's so much fun to see her really taking off with her reading skills! She's been reading one a day, and most of them are 50-60 pages long!

3. Nadia and Ian are doing such a good job in the worship service on Sunday mornings. I wasn't planning on training Ian this early, but he doesn't want to go to children's church any more, and since he's so well  behaved in church (even when I go up to the choir loft), I'm fine with that. I shed a few tears on Sunday when I listened to Nadia singing the hymn "It is well."

4. Oliver eats just about anything. With the exception of blueberry pancakes a few days ago, Ian has been doing better at dinner lately. We just need to get Nadia back on track.

5. Bucknell University (15-20 minutes from our house) is looking to hire a one year visiting professor for their chemistry department. Paul got his Master's degree there, and it's even closer to our house than where he is teaching now. Although we'd prefer a tenure track job offer, we'd much prefer a one year offer from Bucknell than a three year offer that involves moving 500 miles away.

6. Paul's parents came to see Nadia's second basketball game. The kids always love to see their grandparents!

7. Paul had a snow day yesterday!

8. Oliver has gained back the 1.5 pounds he lost and then some! He's up to 24 lb 4oz, which puts him at the 28th percentile, and he now weighs more than Ian did at this age!

9. Two of the last three days, Oliver has slept until at least 7am! He needs to sleep at least 11 hours at night now that he's down to one nap that is between 60-90 minutes long. Thankfully he's been in a much better mood the past three days than he was on Monday. He hasn't totally adjusted to the concept of not taking a morning nap any more, but he's getting there! He did sleep for 10 minutes in the car on the way home from ladies Bible study on Tuesday morning, but other than that he's just been taking one nap a day.

10. Oliver is healthy! Considering the cough Ian and Nadia have had the past couple of weeks, it's not something I am taking for granted. Hopefully his surgery will really take place tomorrow and go very smoothly. We'll be leaving our house at 6:15am, as we're supposed to be there by 10am.

11. The photo of Paul and I dancing is from the summer of 1997. As of tomorrow, Paul and I will have known each other for 17 years as we met on February 7, 1997. I love him SO much!

12. Although Paul's preference would be that I start pursuing a tenure track job for August 2014, I am glad that he supports my decision to stay home at least one more year. I applied for two different FT jobs teaching in an online university. I'm okay with doing that in 2014, but I am not ready to go back to a FT job teaching on campus yet. My department chair emailed me today and said he'd be delighted to write me a letter of reference. Two of my former colleagues also volunteered to write me letters, but I am going to see if I can get ones from my former Dean and such first, as they never observed me teach. Most of the professors who observed me teach are no longer at the university (a couple of them retired, one is in jail, one died, etc.).

Snow Day!

Paul found out last night that he was going to have a snow day today. He usually teaches one lab on Wednesdays. It was good timing for him as tomorrow he's going to be observed by his department chair while he's teaching his class, and he'll also be teaching one lab and teaching a class for another professor (the one who filled in for him last week when he was driving to Indiana). We got about 6 inches of snow, and the kids had fun playing in it! Oliver wouldn't leave his mittens on, and he decided to taste some snow. Nadia, Ian, and Paul spent a lot more time outside than Oliver and I did. AWANA and choir rehearsal were also cancelled this evening.

I spent a few hours today working on a job application, but it wasn't for Paul this time. The most promising prospects for Paul right now are two 3 year temporary positions in Indiana (still waiting to hear the results of those interviews) and a one year temporary position at Bucknell (going to do that application in the next week). The one at Bucknell is highest on our list because we wouldn't need to move. Through the interviewing process over the past year (he's interviewed with 18 schools so far) we've learned that most community colleges require a large teaching load (up to 19 credits a semester) and pay a salary that would require me to at least work part-time in order to make ends meet. Many four year schools require a post doctorate, which he hasn't done. Plan A is that two years as a visiting professor (if another school offers him a contract for the 2014-15 school year) will lead to a tenure track job at a small four year university in 2015, but we're not feeling too certain that will happen.

Plan B would be for me to go back to teaching FT at a university because I made a lot more money, and we'd have more time together as a family. Paul would be a stay-at-home dad and probably work PT - maybe as an adjunct professor or a tutor. I was thinking the earliest I would go back to teaching would be August 2015, but I found an online university that is hiring several professors in early childhood/ elementary education. I would be happy to teach in 2014, if I could do it from home. I am going to apply, but I feel plenty busy right now as it is. If I don't get one of the jobs at this online university, I am perfectly content to be a SAHM for another year. It's been almost exactly 10 years since I last applied for a new job so I had to a lot of work on my resume, and I've also been writing emails asking for new reference letters as my old ones are very outdated. Hopefully by August 2015 one of us will have a tenure track job. I'd prefer it be Paul, but I did enjoy my ten years as a college professor and would enjoy doing it for another 20 years, if that's what ends up happening. Next fall I think I'll be applying for tenure track jobs for both of us, and we'll see what happens. As far as jobs for me, I think I'll be looking at Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, West Virginia, and Tennessee. I am not going to submit any more applications for Paul for community colleges unless their salaries are more in line with what four year schools pay, and I'm not going to submit any more applications for visiting professor positions for him unless they are within a reasonable distance of our current home. I doubt I'll submit anywhere near 88 applications for Paul this time around. The application to Bucknell will be number 21.

Ninth Tooth

This boy LOVES to climb anything and everything!

 Have I mentioned I'm not a fan of the teething process? Wow. Oliver has been fussing and crying almost non-stop the past couple of days. Part of the problem is that he's teething. His sixth tooth on the bottom jaw has erupted, which puts him at nine teeth total. I think the second central incisor on the top will also be breaking through the gum any day now. The second part of the problem is that he's having a hard time transitioning to one nap even though he was showing every indication that he was ready to give that morning nap up. Saturday he took a tiny morning catnap en route to basketball around 11am. Yesterday he truly only had one nap, but it started in the van on the way home from church before he had lunch. I assumed he'd wake up when I took him out of the carseat and took off his coat, but he slept through all that so I went ahead and put him down in his crib. He only slept about 30 minutes, which is definitely not long enough when he only takes one nap! To make matters worse, he got up earlier than usual this morning (bad sleep follows bad sleep as they say).

Adding jelly to the thumbprint cookies

All this meant that he was extremely fussy and did a lot of crying this morning. I put him down at 12:50, and he woke up at 1:45. He cried for less than 5 minutes and then slept until 2:15, which meant he slept a total of 80 minutes. I was hoping for at least two hours, but that was better than yesterday. He hasn't been as fussy this afternoon. The good news is that he is still healthy (no cough!); hopefully it will stay that way so he can have his surgery on Friday.

Ian wrote his whole name for the first time today! The letter we worked on today was "N".

He sounded out the word "top" and figured out how to spell it. Way to go, Ian!

Ian had to read the word to figure out which picture to put with it to complete the puzzle!

Oliver loves ham and cheese hot pockets!

Basketball game #2

The assistant coach lead the team's practice last night, and part of the practice included an unofficial game with another team practicing at the same time. Nadia was the only girl on the court last night (nine boys plus her), and the same was true today for their second game. Paul and the assistant coach were there today. Last Saturday Paul was the only one coaching the team. Last week the team enjoyed keeping score during the game because they won by a landslide. They gave up keeping score today because they were losing by quite a bit. The team they played today was much better than the team they played last week, and the Leopards didn't play as well today in part because one of our team's best players was a bit of a ball hog today (almost never passed the ball). Nadia did make one attempt at a basket today for the first time. She can't actually get the ball anywhere near the net. If she is thrown the ball, she quickly passes it to someone else, although some times she passed it to someone on the other team. Oops! She threw the ball in a few times. She did dribble it a little bit. Mostly she tried to play defense. Even on her teammates. Oops! She didn't stay on "her man" as well today as she did last week, in part because the person she was paired up with was just as clueless. She earned the white star for "Christlikeness" today.

We went in separate cars today, but it probably wasn't necessary because they weren't running behind as much today and Paul also didn't keep the team as long in their "locker room" after the game. Paul's parents also drove to the church to see Nadia's game, and then they spent several hours at our house after the game. The kids are always thrilled to have time with their grandparents! I was thrilled to have Paul back home. He got back around 1am this morning.

Oliver had a hard time with giving up his nap this morning. These transitions are always difficult at first. He slept for about 10 minutes around 11am on the way to Nadia's game. Ian started to fall asleep on the way home from the game and also during dinner, but we kept him awake. I think tomorrow I'm going to have Ian take an afternoon nap. Oliver's afternoon nap was only one hour long even though it was his only nap. Hopefully he'll start sleeping longer for that nap now that it's his only one.